


𝐃𝐨𝐦𝐢𝐧𝐨 🁡 𝑇ℎ𝑒 𝐶𝑎𝑠𝑘 𝑜𝑓 𝐴𝑚𝑜𝑛𝑡𝑖𝑙𝑙𝑎𝑑𝑜

by Adrenalineshots, sonshineandshowers, TheFibreWitch



Series: Domino 🁡 [50]
Category: Prodigal Son (TV 2019)
Genre: Angst, Case Fic, Digital Art, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Gen, Hallucinations, Harassment, Health Emergency, Hurt/Comfort, Implied/Referenced Drug Use, Mental Health Issues, Metafiction, Murder Mystery, Nightmares, Self-Harm, Surrealism, Trauma, Unreliable Narrator, Video, a lot of really strange stuff that happens in altered states of consciousness, anxiousness, reader-driven
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-09-06
Updated: 2020-09-06
Packaged: 2021-03-07 23:26:42
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,418
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26505886
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Adrenalineshots/pseuds/Adrenalineshots, https://archiveofourown.org/users/sonshineandshowers/pseuds/sonshineandshowers, https://archiveofourown.org/users/TheFibreWitch/pseuds/TheFibreWitch
Summary: Selecting 𝑇ℎ𝑒 𝐶𝑎𝑠𝑘 𝑜𝑓 𝐴𝑚𝑜𝑛𝑡𝑖𝑙𝑙𝑎𝑑𝑜 from the bookshelf, Malcolm travels through his own mind.Read this story at:https://www.thedominostory.com/#the-cask-of-amontilladoThis book is one part of the Domino series. If you have not yet read thePrefaceorIntroduction, please head there first.
Series: Domino 🁡 [50]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1926451
Kudos: 1
Collections: Domino 🁡, Prodigal Son Big Bang 2020 - Saturday Posts





	𝐃𝐨𝐦𝐢𝐧𝐨 🁡 𝑇ℎ𝑒 𝐶𝑎𝑠𝑘 𝑜𝑓 𝐴𝑚𝑜𝑛𝑡𝑖𝑙𝑙𝑎𝑑𝑜

**Author's Note:**

  * Inspired by [The Cask of Amontillado](https://archiveofourown.org/external_works/685432) by Edgar Allan Poe. 



> This book is one part of the Domino series. If you have not yet read the [Preface](https://archiveofourown.org/works/26497927/chapters/64577434#workskin) or [Introduction](https://archiveofourown.org/works/26497927/chapters/64588537#workskin), please head there first.
> 
> Betaed by the wonderful [Jameena](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Jameena/), [MissScorp](https://archiveofourown.org/users/MissScorp/), and [ProcrastinatingSab](https://archiveofourown.org/users/ProcrastinatingSab/).
> 
> Credit to the creators and their works that inspired and were referenced in this work:  
>  **— Inspiration:**[The Cask of Amontillado](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Cask_of_Amontillado) \- Edgar Allan Poe  
>  **— Cover Song:**[Bang!](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4THFRpw68oQ) \- AJR

[](https://www.thedominostory.com/images/full/the-cask-of-amontillado.jpg) |   
---|---  
  
The hope chest shakes at the end of Malcolm’s bed. Passed down from generation to generation of Milton, his mother said he had to keep it. “It’s my loft, anyway,” she reminded him, and the large wooden piece of furniture stayed.

He doesn’t mind it, not really. He had thought it would evoke The Girl in the Box, trigger nightmares of years past, but it didn’t seem to affect anything. It sits right at the end of the bed. He can’t sleep most nights, but he’s never connected the two things — they seem more coincidences.

After John Watkins, the hope chest is a fricking disaster. Murmurs near his feet every night. “Little Malcolm, Little Malcolm,” its haunting voice carries through the loft. “Little Malcolm.”

The voice sounds a whole hell of a lot like John, but his mind reasons it can’t be John — John’s locked up in a maximum security prison. Malcolm’s gut thinks otherwise. His hand thinks otherwise. His mind flails the whole chain around his brain _screaming_ otherwise.

Malcolm can’t sleep. The Surgeon on his shoulder whispers he should’ve killed the man. Gabrielle on his other shoulder tells him to breathe. She cites exercise after exercise, yet they all vacate his mind that is too focused on _the voice_.

“Little Malcolm.”

Fuck him. John had stabbed him over a twenty year grudge with a kid. He doesn't deserve space in Malcolm’s brain. Malcolm’s brain deserves _sleep_.

“If you hadn’t stabbed him,” The Surgeon says, tsk-tsking Malcolm’s behavior.

“He’s only a hallucination,” Gabrielle tells him. “You know how to deal with this.”

Malcolm doesn’t. Dealing is listening to all of the stray fragments of voices that sometimes appear in his brain. He doesn’t tell her about half of them. How could she possibly think he is managing? Dealing? The whole deck is gone and then some.

“Little Malcolm.”

Malcolm’s going to find a hammer and smash the chest to a million pieces. Milton family heirloom be damned — he can’t have that man in his loft. He gets out of bed, rummages in the closet for his tools, and comes out with a claw hammer shaking in his hand.

Plus side — it’s not ball peen. Minus side — it’s still a hammer. Triggering as fuck, and he drops it, the bang resounding through the loft. Sunshine screeches at the disturbance, and he wants to let out an angsty shriek.

“Little Malcolm.”

His yell echoes off the wall a few inches in front of him. He doesn’t even recognize the sound, so broken and disturbed.

“That’s it, my boy,” The Surgeon encourages.

“Malcolm, you need to breathe,” Gabrielle says, steady puffs going into his ear.

Malcolm can’t. He can’t focus on anything but the recurring voice from the hope chest. “Little Malcolm. Little Malcolm. Little Malcolm.”

Repeating the phrase three times doesn’t seem to get him out of the predicament. Nor does looking at the ceiling as if he can call for some higher help.

Maybe he can go upstairs. He bounds to the top, wedges himself in the tub, and closes the curtain. The porcelain is cold on his toes, the hard shell tough on his back without any water to soothe.

“Little Malcolm.”

Malcolm bangs his head against the tile, the thud momentarily dulling his senses. He can’t do this, can’t let his father’s murderous friend win.

“Little Malcolm.”

Hands reaching out as if he’ll find a crowbar, Malcolm comes back with nothing. He has no defenses against the man’s advances. John Watkins will forever inhabit his loft as long as that chest is in it. And Malcolm can’t get rid of it.

“Little Malcolm.”

Malcolm jolts at the voice, hitting his head on the tile again. It doesn’t really hurt, just gives a temporary reprieve before the sound of the world returns. It comes whooshing back, the silence fading to the voice from downstairs.

How the fuck is it traveling all the way upstairs? And how the fuck can he get rid of it?

“Little Malcolm.”

Malcolm begins beating his head against the tile like rolling drumsticks, the rat-tat-tat running to a distant melody. The conductor’s telling him “faster, faster,” so he continues, building up to a rattling rhythm.

“—le Mal—“ the voice comes in more broken, more distorted.

His vision blurs in the darkness. The glow of the nightlight becomes a dozen fireflies flitting around, cheering on his efforts. Thud, thud, thud — if he can keep it up, the voice will disappear.

“L— —m” the voice is merely stray letters, but Malcolm still knows what it says. _Little Malcolm, Little Malcolm, Little Malcolm_ — it wants every bit of his existence. Rampaging through one house wasn’t enough — it needs to conquer his loft as well.

Malcolm’s ears ring, his ability to hear dulled to a flood. Pain blocks out his ability to do anything else, and the voice disappears to murmurs as if slowed down so much there are only tones left.

“Lllllllllllll. Mmmmmmm.” Malcolm can still discern what it’s trying to say. Even on the brink of unconsciousness, it’s coming after him. He can’t escape.

There’s no hope.

Any chance he had at surviving John Watkins was back in his mother’s basement, stealing the knife or swinging the hammer at his face. Or perhaps in his mother’s living room, using the crowbar like a baseball bat and knocking him into next week. Repeating the performance until blood spatter was strewn all over the ceiling, the man’s face no longer recognizable.

Would someone recognize Malcolm? Who would even find him? His skull has to be bashed in by now, potential internal bleeding killing him at that very moment. If he holds his head just right, perhaps blood will pour out his ear. Or maybe his eyes, crying for the man that would discover his corpse.

“Mmmmmmmm.” The voice is almost gone in the distance. Yet it remains in Malcolm’s head.

Sliding down in the tub, Malcolm hopes he’ll be sheltered from any further torture. He’s losing his battle with staying awake, and he welcomes it, thinking that the voice will finally disappear.

He slips into unconsciousness, embracing the darkness.

“Little Malcolm.”

— ◌◯◌ —

All of Edrisa’s working hours have been spent at the morgue since transporting Veronica back from the scene. It’s not unusual, expected even, but she hasn’t gone out on any calls for other cases, leaving them to other medical examiners in the department. There’s one priority right now — finding out what happened to the victim so they can perhaps learn more about what may have happened to Bright. Her responsibility is rooted with the victim first, but she hopes her findings will help both of them.

She called the team to the morgue to share what she learned, and they both look back at her with impatient eyes, hands resting near pockets and hips. "What do you know about toxicity?” she asks, eager to assist.

"That you should please get to why it's important as Mr. Twenty Questions isn't here," JT says, brow tight in a frown.

"You don't need to be a spoilsport."

"Edrisa," Dani prompts.

"The victim was poisoned," Edrisa says. "There's nothing else from autopsy to indicate otherwise. It'll take time to get the tox results back, though."

"You already figured that," JT says.

"Well, now I'm confirming that." Her hair shakes, miffed that they don’t match her enthusiasm.

"That's all you have?" JT says, exasperated.

"My job is as much ruling things out as it is confirming. I did my job. _Incredibly_ well, I might add." Worked as quickly as possible to contribute what she could to the team. Called them the second she had a conclusive answer. Put a rush on the requests for further tests.

They turn to leave, the morgue not holding anything else for them. She doesn’t even get a thank you, and that ticks her off more than she’ll ever admit, leaves her resting her hands on her hips like they had been doing.

"H-have you heard anything at all? How's Bright? Any change? Any possibility he's ready to profile the killer?" Edrisa rambles on. They can’t leave so soon without sharing an update in return.

Dani turns back. "I'll let you know as soon as we hear anything."

Edrisa is left alone again, hoping for more work to distract her from dwelling on Bright. Hopefully it won’t come in the form of his body showing up on her table. Doors closing in the distance echo into the refrigerated drawers, taunting with knocks to let him out.

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks for reading. Head back to the [Bookshelf](https://archiveofourown.org/works/26497927/chapters/64588570#workskin) to pick another book. :)


End file.
